HAMPTON, Ga. -- Sunday evening, while his men surrounded their No. 48 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet, crew chief Chad Knaus, who had helped push Jimmie Johnson's ride back to the garage area while looking absolutely engrossed in thought, continued in that mode.

When the car was stopped behind its hauler -- located on the end of the row, closest to the gate out to the racetrack to denote its driver's status as the previous season's champion, Knaus walked around it, furrowing his brow and while not exactly scowling, definitely not smiling.

Kobalt Tools 500

Official Results

Pos.	Driver	Make
1.	Kyle Busch	Toyota
2.	Tony Stewart	Toyota
3.	Dale Earnhardt Jr.	Chevrolet
4.	Greg Biffle	Ford
5.	Jeff Gordon	Chevrolet
6.	Clint Bowyer	Chevrolet
7.	Kevin Harvick	Chevrolet
8.	Matt Kenseth	Ford
9.	Brian Vickers	Toyota
10.	Jeff Burton	Chevrolet
13.	Jimmie Johnson	Chevrolet

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He opened the car's hood and looked inside, then borrowed a mechanic's glove to burrow into the engine compartment.

Hardly saying a word, Knaus left, heading toward the far end of the garage and picking his way through a mass of mechanics, equipment and onlookers that could only occur during the breakdown of a circus site -- or the packing up of a Sprint Cup garage.

It was only 15 minutes after the checkered flag had fallen over the Kobalt Tools 500. Two-time defending Cup champion Johnson had just finished 13th -- only his second finish worse than sixth in his last 10 Atlanta Motor Speedway starts -- and Knaus was nearly beside himself.

Knaus walked halfway down the row of transporters until he found Hendrick teammate and fellow crew chief Tony Eury Jr., whose No. 88 Impala SS and driver Dale Earnhardt Jr. had finished third behind race winner Kyle Busch and Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota teammate Tony Stewart.

The men talked for maybe five minutes, before Knaus walked quietly back to his transporter, where he again stood alongside the car, his chin resting in his hand as he stared at the silent, black-and-silver piece. Then he walked away to lean on a nearby pit cart.

When asked if the good timing that enabled Johnson to get not one, but two free passes to get back on the lead lap in the race's final 93 laps was one positive that could be taken away from the day, Knaus finally smiled, though the revelation was little consolation.

"Yeah -- sometimes you need a little bit of luck, and we got some [Sunday]," Knaus said. "We were able to stay on the lead lap -- barely."

That Johnson could get back on the lead lap with 93 laps left and fall back off it only 25 laps later, was a statement of how the day had gone. Sunday's outing was bad enough that Johnson barely ever scratched into the top 10 in the running order over 325 laps, and was the last car on the lead lap at the checkered flag.

"It was just out of control," Knaus said of his team's Impala. "I didn't get it -- same as last week [at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, a 29th-place finish]. I don't know what happened [but] trust me, we're working hard trying to get it figured out.

"I mean, it's not like we're going home and relaxing, but I don't know ... We're working. We're working to get smarter every time we get on the racetrack and sometimes it's just as important to learn what doesn't work as what does work."

Johnson's second consecutive title defending season is only four races old, but it hasn't begun the way the champ, his crew chief or their Hendrick team expected.

Sunday's race at Atlanta epitomized it, as the man who had won both 2007 races on the fast, 1.54-mile oval struggled to qualify 11th, then never threatened to get near the front of the pack on his way to a 13th-place finish.

Last year, after four races Johnson had won twice and was fourth in the standings, 28 points out of first.

This season is the first exclusively using NASCAR's new chassis with which Johnson, Knaus and company scored five of their league-leading 10 victories last season. But following one second-place at Auto Club Speedway, along with two finishes of 27th and 29th to go with Sunday's stinker, Johnson is unofficially 13th in the standings, 198 points behind leader Busch.

So far, Earnhardt -- the newest recruit at Hendrick -- is the best of the organization in the standings, unofficially in sixth after Atlanta. Jeff Gordon's fifth-place finish Sunday enabled him to jump eight spots, to 15th; while fourth driver Casey Mears has been plagued by lousy luck but used a workable 17th-place finish Sunday to jump five spots to 30th.

The storylines at Atlanta were many and, after his sub-par run Johnson's media obligations were few, so he quickly left the garage. None of his comments were available.

For the past two seasons -- even over their entire seven-year Cup career -- Johnson and Knaus have been an efficient, effective tandem surrounded by an equally enabled crew. But so far, other than an effective, pole-winning outing at Daytona and the California performance, the new car has been a mystery to them on NASCAR's intermediate speedways.

Knaus said no additional testing is scheduled, short term.

"Right now my guys are so whipped and the driver's so whipped with everything we've had going on, I need to probably give them a little bit of time off after Bristol," Knaus said. "So we'll just have to see how it works out."

After the Daytona opener and three consecutive races on "intermediate" racetracks, the series returns to Bristol, where the new car made its debut a year ago, followed by a week later at Martinsville, where Johnson scored his first victory with the car.

Knaus said there were even plusses and minuses to that.

"I'd rather just skip Bristol, to be honest with you, but of course the way we're running, it really won't hurt us too much," Knaus said with a laugh. "But I'm looking forward to Martinsville, for sure."

Knaus said that, with the exception of different tires and some minor rules adjustments, the car the team will take to Martinsville, where Johnson survived a savage pounding of his rear bumper by teammate Gordon over the race's final laps before holding him off by scant feet, will be the same.

But with the limited adjustments that can be made to make the tires work better with the new chassis, there's one thing that might not change any time soon.

"There are no tools," Knaus said of the car's limited adjustability, as he laughed despite himself. "And that's frustrating."